Estimation of Soil Carbon Storage in the Japanese Cedar Plantations with Different Ages in Xitou Area, Central Taiwan.

Estimation of Soil Carbon Storage in the Japanese Cedar Plantations with Different Ages in Xitou Area, Central Taiwan

Chuang-Wen Pai^{1, 2} Chih-Hsin Cheng³ Chih-Yu Hung⁴ Ya-Nan Wang^{5, 6} Chiou-Pin Chen^1'

Japanese cedar (Chrytomeria japonica D. Don) was first introduced into Sitou, central Taiwan in 1910 and has become a very important and widespread plantation species in Taiwan. Four Japanese cedar plantations with different stand ages between 40 to 90 years were selected for investigating the effect of Japanese cedar stand age on soil carbon pool.  The results showed that soil pH, bulk density, stone content negatively correlated with soil carbon storage of four study sites in polynomial regression, whereas there was a positive correlation between clay content and CEC and soil carbon storage, respectively. The soil carbon storage generally decreased with soil depth in four plantations. The soil carbon storage of site CJ 20, CJ 41, and CJ 50, whose stand age is 90, 70 and 60, are nearly equal (78.91, 81.80, and 75.76 ton C ha^-1). Forty-year-old site CJ 73, the youngest plantation, has the highest soil carbon storage (140.53 ton C ha^-1). There is no significant correlation between soil carbon storage and the stand age of Japanese cedar in four study sites, which is not quiet correspond with the results obtained by some previous studies. It was noticed that the stand density in site CJ 73 is also the highest among four study sites, and the stand density of the rest of plantations are between 408 and 617 trees ha^-1. It is suggested that the stand density might affect the estimation of soil carbon storage in Japanese cedar plantations. Thus, the effect of stand density on soil carbon storage in Taiwan needs to be further investigated in the future.

°iKey words°jXitou, Japanese Cedar, Soil Carbon Storage

1. Assistant Researcher, the Experimental Forest, College of Bio-resources and Agriculture, National Taiwan University, Nantou, Taiwan

2. Adjunct Assistant Professor, School of Forestry and Resource Conservation, College of Bio-resources and Agriculture, National

  Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan

3. Assistant Professor, School of Forestry and Resource Conservation, College of Bio-resources and Agriculture, National Taiwan

  University, Taipei, Taiwan

4. Graduate student, School of Forestry and Resource Conservation, College of Bio-resources and Agriculture, National Taiwan

  University, Taipei, Taiwan

5. Director, the Experimental Forest, College of Bio-resources and Agriculture, National Taiwan University, Nantou, Taiwan

6. Professor, School of Forestry and Resource Conservation, College of Bio-resources and Agriculture, National Taiwan University,

  Taipei, Taiwan

*Corresponding Author. E-mail address: 1333@exfo.ntu.edu.tw

Present Address: No.12, Section 1, Chien-Shan Road, Chu-Shan, 55750 Nan-Tou Hsien, Taiwan